Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-8bljj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-16T21:47:18.849Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

1 - The American Background

from PART ONE - HISTORICAL CONTEXTS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 May 2006

Donald Pizer
Affiliation:
Tulane University, Louisiana
Get access

Summary

Although realism and naturalism could have sprung up independently in the United States, the historical fact is that they flourished earlier in the European countries all the way eastward to Russia and that American writers were especially stimulated by British and French models. On the other hand, though a still provincial, moralizing culture might have rejected realism and naturalism as alien or profane or harmful, nevertheless they did become established in the postbellum United States. Even Richard Chase, whose The American Novel and Its Tradition (1957) had argued that the romance was the quintessential mode of fiction in the United States, felt compelled to declare: 'After all, realism, although it was there from the beginning, did “rise,” or at least became conscious of itself as a significant, liberalizing and forwardlooking literary program. Whole areas of the American novel, both classic and modern, are closed to any reader who . . . thinks that it contains no meaningful element of realism.'

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1995

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • The American Background
  • Edited by Donald Pizer, Tulane University, Louisiana
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to American Realism and Naturalism
  • Online publication: 28 May 2006
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521433002.002
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • The American Background
  • Edited by Donald Pizer, Tulane University, Louisiana
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to American Realism and Naturalism
  • Online publication: 28 May 2006
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521433002.002
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • The American Background
  • Edited by Donald Pizer, Tulane University, Louisiana
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to American Realism and Naturalism
  • Online publication: 28 May 2006
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CCOL0521433002.002
Available formats
×